ARKit Bringing Augmented Reality Audio To iOS

Artist and developer Zach Lieberman shared this quick demonstration of an augmented reality app that lets you record sound in space, and then play it back by moving through it.

It’s leveraging ARKit, a new framework in iOS 11 that makes it easier for developers to create augmented reality apps for iPhone and iPad. ARKit handles blending digital objects and information with video and data from your device’s sensors.

Because ARKit is part of iOS 11, there will very quickly be a platform of hundreds of millions of devices that are capable of being used for augmented reality audio apps.

While this video is capturing a quick test, it’s an example of how augmented reality and audio can work together. Augmented reality could be used for audio tours, placing audio ‘blobs’ spatially close to the objects they discuss. It could be used to create interactive audio works. And it could be used, as in the demo video, as a new type of interface for musique concrète audio manipulation.

Check it out and let us know what you think! And, if you know of other augmented reality audio apps, leave a link in teh comments!

***very*** cool. There are a huge number of ways this could be used: imagine taking a 3D audio/video ‘snapshot’ of an environment and pulling samples from it. Or several people interacting to make music together. Heck, just adding color to the sound blobs would be pretty amazing.

Something To Think About

It is better to make a piece of music than to perform one, better to perform one than to listen to one, better to listen to one than to misuse it as a means of distraction, entertainment, or acquisition of ”culture.”